I read a challenging article on Sanctification (the term means the process by which God changes us to make us holy, or more like Christ).
The author described a problem we face as believers – the problem of “time.” At first, when we become followers of Christ, especially if our life has been ungodly, we have a pretty accurate view of ourselves and our sin. We don’t “look down on other people” because we’re so aware of our sin and how God, in grace, has rescued us. We find it natural to look up to Jesus and focus on him.
Then, the article went on to say, something happens – time. The memory of our sin fades, and with it the memory of the cross. We sing about it, but it loses its centrality in our daily lives. We become more “mature” believers and our “knowledge” of Christian things increases, but we stop looking up at Jesus and the cross, and start looking “down” at other people and their failures. When this happens, the article concluded,
Real sanctification ceases. This doesn’t mean that we stop being moral or that we quit gaining in theological knowledge. What it means is that we begin to equate our morality and our theological knowledge with sanctification.
Instead of becoming like Jesus, we become proud. I think the author hit the nail on the head. The article ended with a challenge to contemplate God’s holiness. It is there we see again our own sinfulness and wickedness. And that brings us back to the cross. Thankfully, the author concludes, when our awareness of the greatness of the chasm between us and God increases, “the cross becomes larger,” large enough to fill the chasm and provides us not only a place of justification, but also place of sanctification and glorification. “The key to our sanctification is the gospel. If we are going to become more like Jesus, we will do so at the foot of the cross as grace flows down.”
Thanks be to God for the cross.
